I don’t remember being asked to see the inauguration before. Students were very interested because of all the media hype this time. Not one student actually listened to any speech.(boring) They mostly just asked who each dignitary was..ie former Presidents etc, and I could point out who each person was. Some students didn’t watch and worked on math homework. But, we were required to make it available by our school. As a registered Republican and campaign worker for Sarah Palen and McCain I found it amusing that such a big deal was made of this one. We discussed the outrageous cost compared to the Bush inauguration in a time of economic crisis. Also, a person from our town is in the Secret Service guarding the VP so we were also looking for him in the crowd. All in all, my students were not impressed by all the hoopla. I also used it as a teachable moment to discuss respect of public officials. New York is actually lucky in one respect. You Americans took Hillary off our hands!! Yay. But I can’t say that in school of course. Sorry to go on, but don’t assume that I “forced” anyone to watch that 1/2 hour. It was strictly voluntary. And I repeat, no person listened intently to any speech. My Sarah Palen buttons are saved at home. Some day I will be the first to have one when she runs again. Once I am retired I can “come out of the closet” as a Republican in New York State. (I worked the headquarters and phone bank only - not in school)
I live in a pretty ‘red’ area. My 14 year old son (a HS Freshman) had the ‘opportunity’ to watch the Inauguration. His teacher had it on the in classroom television and told the kids, if you want to watch it go ahead; otherwise, study or use the time for homework. She them remarked ‘she had to have it ‘on’ and she didn’t want any trouble by turning it ‘off.’ He said two girls watched; everyone else did other schoolwork (which he thought was pretty cool as he had a basketball game and got his homework done). Apparently, the teachers were told to show the Inauguration.
My youngest son is in 6th grade. They watched as well (no opportunity to do anything else by choice). He thought it was pretty boring. Neither had to do any sort of homework or essay on it thought...and I know many schools did require some sort of follow up.